Jiriki and Tariki

Jiriki [地力]

The characters/ideograms mean "self power; one's own potential; real ability; one's own strength." The first character means, "ground; Earth," the second character means, "power; strength; strong; strain; bear up; exert." It is the rehabilitation of oneself through one's own efforts.

Jiriki or self-power is in reference to one's acknowledgement that all things that happen are either directly or indirectly caused and affected by you as an individual. It is therefore necessary to remove the negativity, ego and pride, etc. from within yourself rather than looking to others or ourside sources to change you as an individual.

Martial Arts is a blend of both inner work and outer influence work to gain mastery. In the beginning one is dependent on "outside help (tariki [他力])" simply because in order to practice and train you have to learn knowledge and ability in the form of principles, fundamentals and basics. Yet there must come a time when one must reach beyond tariki and gain momentum, inspiration and progress through self-reflective promotion of self-power whereby one achieves mastery beyond the fundamental aspects of martial systems.

The analogy used to help explain this concept is derived from the term tariki, i.e. what the Japanese called the way of the kitten. As a kitten needs its mother to pick it up by the scruff and carry it so does the fledgling budo-ka but when the kitten is older, wiser and more experienced the mother stops carrying the kitten by the scruff of the neck and requires the cat to go out on its own and survive.

Tariki [他力]

The characters/ideograms mean "outside help; salvation by faith." The first character means, "other; another; the others," the second character means, "power; strength; strong; strain; bear up; exert." It is the reliance upon others for attaining one's own objective.

Tariki is reliance upon others. Where this starts to become an issue of concern is when it extends beyond the initial acquisition of knowledge necessary for the person to seek jiriki for issues, conflicts and life's way. It is relying on the perceptions, cultures and beliefs of others to fix yourself.

It may be necessary to seek out things from others as that is the way of the group, the dojo, and society but one must still seek within themselves answers to the questions that involve the self, you, the individual.

It is like making the assumption that others know better than you. Experts are not the end all of knowledge but merely higher conduits of the flow of knowledge one must assimilate and process with a modicum of skepticism and validation of other sources to decide for "yourself."

This is the essence of martial arts training, practice and applications. If you are angry all the time it is not up to others to find out why and do something about it, it is up to you.